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Seto Kaiba

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  1. Seto Kaiba
    Not up on paper sizes, myself... but it's the same size as the other VFMF books.
  2. Seto Kaiba
    Well, part of that might be because the Independent Special Command units aren't really squadrons, per se... whereas the special operations teams like Diamond and Emerald Force are. The VF-22 book does something bizarre here... they show a Uraga-class carrier with the Saratoga II's hull number (565) circa 2044, but it's a normal Uraga-class carrier attached to the Macross-7 fleet instead of the Macross-13 fleet variant that actually appeared in the Macross VF-X2 game. There IS a VF-X Ravens VF-22 in the book on page 111... with special commemorative markings for "Holtzand 10th Anniversary"? Well, they sometimes reprint squadrons from other VFMF books... but that's kind of rare.
  3. Seto Kaiba
    The ejection diagram in the old Sky Angels VF-1 tech manual (penned shortly after the series) shows the parachute is in the seatback.
  4. Seto Kaiba
    That's one possibility... I'll know for sure once my copy rolls in in a few days, but "Sewell Independent Space Force" almost sounds like it could be the local military (not NUNS) of some emigrant planet.
  5. Seto Kaiba
    Hmm... now I am doubly curious.
  6. Seto Kaiba
    Very curious what that X-like symbol on Charlotte Grace's pilot suit and that VF-25 is... can't make out what's written on the plane, but it's "_____ Independent Space Force?" This is gonna drive me nuts while I wait for the EMS package with my copy.
  7. Seto Kaiba
    You're off a bit there... The old Sky Angels book puts forth equivalent armor values for the overtechnology materials used on the VF-1 that put their durability (or damage resistance) at 100 times that of a comparable thickness of rolled homogeneous steel armor. It was explosives that got a 10x improvement (in yield for weight, the AMM-1's 20kg warhead being equivalent to 200kg of TNT).
  8. Seto Kaiba
    Not quite... he said he wanted to get away from passively stealthy airframes, which is almost the same thing considering the focus of 5th Generation fighters. While Kawamori might've possibly used the T-50 PAK-FA as an inspiration, I think most of it actually comes from his VF-EXPERIMENT column... where he did a couple design studies in the vein of "How the VF-1 might've looked if I designed it in 2000".
  9. Seto Kaiba
    There are a bunch of little realistic touches like that scattered around here and there... though the solution is usually in the form of "because newer fighters were made with more advanced overtechnology materials than the previous generation". Technology in Macross isn't static... humanity's grasp of the various sciences involved marches ever onward, just like it does in the real world. Nah, there's always been a pretty definite set of limits on exactly what the material can take... particularly where g-force induced stresses are concerned. There are a bunch of things OTM can't cheat out of the way... but size constraints are one of the biggies when it comes to updating older airframes to the same technological standards as more modern ones. The airframes that are usually mentioned as having been relatively easy to modernize are the ones that have lots of free space in the design... most notably the VF-14.
  10. Seto Kaiba
    It was, briefly, but the hull breach they opened up with their missiles was sealed by an emergency bulkhead and (presumably) pressure was restored.
  11. Seto Kaiba
    That's a wide-open field of inquiry... because unfortunately the only VF engine we have a mass for is the FF-2001.
  12. Seto Kaiba
    Sort of? From the sound of it, it's more focused on the circumstances of development than the technological nitty-gritty details of operation... the former bit definitely had overlap with the VF-19 Master File, in that it's talking about some of the pilots who got hurt testing YF-19 No.1 (the two deaths and two severe injuries Jan talks about).
  13. Seto Kaiba
    Pretty much, yeah... because the VF-19's performance makes it extremely difficult to control, even after the design was modified for easier use, and the VF-171 is pretty much the Goldilocks plane in that respect. Eh... I think a better comparison might be more like a family car vs. an Indy car. The Indy car is very, VERY fast but it's only really useful for going really fast and it's only really good for a few things... and if you lose control of it for a second, you're going to be in a bad place. The family car might not go as fast, but you COULD do most of the same things an Indy car does with it if you really wanted to, and it can do a lot of other things the Indy car can't Considering the YF-19 managed to maim two test pilots and KILL two more before Isamu got his hands on it, I think that's fair...
  14. Seto Kaiba
    This is explicitly correct for Macross... substantial airframe redesign and reinforcement were necessary to adapt older airframes to use newer, more powerful reaction engines. Otherwise you'd run the risk of the airframe simply flying to pieces.
  15. Seto Kaiba
    Well... that's a question of how you want to define "better". On a lot of levels, the Shinsei Industry VF-19 Excalibur and General Galaxy VF-171 Nightmare Plus are comparable in performance... active stealth, pinpoint barrier, fold booster compatibility, etc. The key areas of difference and what made the Nightmare Plus a more attractive option than the Excalibur for a lot of local New UN Spacy forces, is in the engine output and ease of control. The VF-19 has substantially greater engine power and greater agility than the VF-171, but at the expense of pushing the limits of the human body's g-force tolerances and being very difficult to control for the average pilot. Even experienced pilots like Isamu had a hard time adapting to the VF-19's extreme maneuverability. That's why the Nightmare Plus became such an attractive option... it was much more stable, and that increase in stability combined with its detuned engines, meant that the Nightmare Plus was a much more forgiving aircraft for inexperienced and average pilots. Being easy on the pilot and highly versatile made the Nightmare Plus a very attractive prospect for next main fighter (and I'm sure its cost performance being better didn't hurt any feelings either). In terms of raw performance, the VF-19 is "better"... unless you intend to have pilots who are less than exceptional flying it, in which case the stability and ease of control of the Nightmare Plus arguably makes it the better aircraft.
  16. Seto Kaiba
    Prior to Macross Frontier, my favorite Macross leading lady was Ishtar... Now, I have to admit, I'd hard a hard time choosing between Ishtar and Sheryl Nome.
  17. Seto Kaiba
    Well, they haven't completely abandoned the term... it crops up a lot in Variable Fighter Master File, for instance. They just gave the acronym a slightly different meaning. It became "Fuel, Arms, and Sensors Tactical" in the VF-25 book. The most recent volume (the VF-22 book) still uses it.
  18. Seto Kaiba
    That's definitely a Nightmare Plus. Incidentally, has anyone found an online store that's actually carrying this one? I've struck out on my usual two. EDIT: Never mind, even though the book is titled in English it only shows up if you search on the book's title in Japanese on HMV.
  19. Seto Kaiba
    Yeah, there are some minor differences... enhanced avionics, leg munitions bays, the deletion of the bayonet from the gunpod, etc.
  20. Seto Kaiba
    Nope.
  21. Seto Kaiba
    It was a S-3B Viking. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_S-3_Viking#/media/File:Viking_S-3B.jpg <- Front view of a real-world S-3B Viking.
  22. Seto Kaiba
    Er... having read Starship Troopers, my gut reaction is "almost certainly not". The two couldn't be more different, thematically. Macross is all about love, peaceful coexistence, music as a universal language, and other uplifting stuff. Starship Troopers is often accused (not without reason) of being a love-letter to militarism and fascism, where no character even considers any course of action other than annihilating the sentient Pseudo-arachnids* in the name of manifest destiny. I think the Vajra were more an attempt to provide an inscrutable adversary instead of one who was practically human, though it would appear from the concept art that their anatomy was inspired by Zentradi mecha (though in-universe it's probably the other way 'round). EDIT: Yeah, as far as the Vajra's motivations, there's something said in the final episode about the Vajra not understanding that humans were an intelligent species, and trying to "rescue" Ranka from them because she was (unintentionally) communicating the way they do... by fold waves. (Probably didn't help that her signature song produces a fold wave equivalent to a Vajra mating call...) * In the original Starship Troopers novel, the Pseudo-arachnid "bugs" were not the mindless hive-mind monsters seen in the Starship Troopers movies... they were actually arachnid in form, individually sentient, telepathic, and of comparable intelligence to a human. They also technologically at least on par with humanity, including faster-than-light spacraft, directed energy weapons, and guided missile systems.
  23. Seto Kaiba
    Ah, OK. I misunderstood your inquiry. You need something mounted in the pilot seat slot, whether it's EX-Gear or a conventional pilot seat, otherwise, you'd have no stick, throttle, or pedals to operate the plane with. It is, however, worth noting that under normal circumstances the pilot would not disembark in his EX-Gear. When you remove the EX-Gear, you're essentially taking both the pilot seat and the controls with you, which is why it's normally left in the plane unless a pilot is abandoning a downed or disabled aircraft (e.g. being shot down, being disabled by the enemy, or suffering a complete loss of control as in Ep13). Though, I suppose, since the jump seat is standard equipment on the VF-25, Alto COULD in fact have operated Gilliam's VF-25F without EX-Gear, but he'd be piloting from the back seat the way Sheryl was. Yes... the Genocidas design was a Kawamori concept that predated Macross's original series, and served as an inspiration for the early transformable fighter concept designs (the "Breast Fighter") that ultimately became the VF-1 Valkyrie. I think Kawamori may have found a bit of inspiration WRT powered suits in the novel Starship Troopers, which Studio Nue did a relatively faithful adaptation of in '87.
  24. Seto Kaiba
    They are... they're mentioned on the Compendium, and Variable Fighter Master File: VF-22 Sturmvogel II even has a diagram that helpfully shows how intake air gets to those vanes and even labels them ホバー ベーン (hover vane). (It's on page 66 if anyone cares.)
  25. Seto Kaiba
    That'd be premature... and I really wish you'd stop trying to crowbar that baloney acronym in. The underside of the internal bay door right beneath the intake is where the gunpods are stored when they're mounted internally on the -22. Toys, obviously, take certain liberties. On the -21, that appears to be nothing more than a flat panel over the articulations for the door. That'd be consistent with General Galaxy's design practices, yes. Doesn't seem like it, based on the available material... the descriptions I can find in Chronicle and Great Mechanics.DX indicate the material is a new, flexible composite material. Variable Fighter Master File has a cutaway of the VF-22 wing that shows the wing's internal structure, which has a modest internal frame surrounded by 9 Y-shaped actuator arms that are responsible for bending or flexing the wing surface in different ways... four on the leading edge, four on the trailing edge, and one on the wingtip. Nah, we see Sheryl operate ("fly" might be generous considering her demonstrated skill level) Michel's VF-25G without EX-Gear in Macross Frontier's TV series. The episode is "Mother's Lullaby", about 12 minutes in. Note that while Michel ejected wearing military EX-Gear, HER seat was an ordinary control chair. As far as I'm aware, the actual inspiration for the design comes from one Kawamori's pre-Macross projects... Genocidas. Design-wise, it looks vaguely similar to the old Honda powered exoskeleton.
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